The WFCA's mission is "to instill and develop in students communication skills vital for a lifetime of effective participation in a democratic society." To that end, the WFCA promotes the interests of Wisconsin interscholastic forensics by assisting in the regulation and improvement of forensic practices and by serving as a forum for the airing of opinions concerning forensic activities. Member schools receive notices of invitational tournaments through an official mailing list. The season culminates with the State Tournament, open to every member school. Read more ...

See the video of coaches reflecting on the impact of forensics and scenes from the 2010 State Tournament.

Invitational Tournaments

The invitational tournaments of the 2015 season are underway. For a list of tournaments see the Competition tab at the top and then either Calendar (all scheduled events) or Tournament Invites (invitations received so far). Send tournament invitations to be posted to
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After the tournament, tournament hosts can also send results to be posted on the calendar & invitation pages.

The Category Committee's proposal to change Four Minute Speaking to Expository Speaking involves replacing "Four Minute Speaking" with "Expository Speaking" and changing associated references to time limits from 4 minutes to 5 minutes. This proposal was tabled.

Past-President Kirt Graves has submitted five proposals to bring the WFCA Operating Bylaws into compliance with current common practices, or simply to bring awareness to policies forgotten or ignored.I. Eliminate the late fee for schools who register after December 1 PASSEDII. Correct/clarify the policy of eliminating entries with highest number of points PASSEDIII. Eliminate specific penalties for team cancellations PASSEDIV. Replace "tournament manager" with "tournament director" PASSEDV. Clarify that the Hall of Fame Award may be given to a current coach PASSED

Other Proposals:

From the Category Committee: see separate article.

From Jon Balcerak:In the category rules for Duo Interpretation, Farrago, Oral Interpretation of Literature, Play Acting, Solo Acting Humorous, and Solo Acting Serious, the sentence concerning adaptations should be changed to the following:

"Adaptations, if any, should be minimal, and may be made for the following purposes only: (1) to establish continuity; (2) to establish contextual clarity, such as the substitution of gender pronouns; or (3) to avoid potentially offensive language. Lines attributed to one character in the literary script may not be attributed to another character during the performance." PASSED with a slight change of wording to (2): for gender changes including things such as pronoun changes

The 2014-15 handbook has been updated from last year's edition to include these changes that were implemented at the spring & fall meeting:

2015 Topics

Moments in History – This season's time period is 1700-1750.

Special Occasion Speaking –This season's occasions are:

A. A Speech in Honor of a RetireeB. A Speech of ProtestC. A Public ApologyD. A Speech to Foreign Visitors

Storytelling – This season's topics are:

A. A Story About a Party or CelebrationB. A Story of Justice or InjusticeC. A Story from or about WisconsinD. A Story of an Urban Legend

Changes affecting multiple categories:

Duo Interpretation, Farrago, Group Interpretive Reading, Oral Interpretation of Literature, Play Acting, Poetry, Prose, Solo Acting (Humorous and Serious): clarification of published material – "Published material is considered any material publically or commercially available in print, online, audio, or video form."

Farrago, Oral Interpretation of Literature, Poetry, Prose: instead of prohibiting walking, the rule now reads that "Platform movement should be minimal and non-intrusive to the performance"

Duo Interpretation, Farrago, Oral Interpretation of Literature, Play Acting, Solo Acting Humorous, and Solo Acting Serious: the sentence concerning adaptations is changed to the following: "Adaptations, if any, should be minimal, and may be made for the following purposes only: (1) to establish continuity; (2) for gender changes including things such as pronoun changes; or (3) to avoid potentially offensive language. Lines attributed to one character in the literary script may not be attributed to another character during the performance."

Other changes from the Spring & Fall meetings

William Hintz Memorial Award for Coaching Excellence name has been reinstated for the former Founders' Award

Membership late fee eliminated

Smaller changes or language cleanup in the bylaws: Correct/clarify the policy of eliminating entries with highest number of points; Eliminate specific penalties for team cancellations; Replace "tournament manager" with "tournament director"; Clarify that the Hall of Fame Award may be given to a current coach